Hey, how's it going? Dave 2D here, and this is the Lenovo Y720. So the review for this thing is long overdue
They actually showcased this laptop at CES of 2017, so that's like eight months ago
And I finally was able to get my review unit in last week, and I've been playing with it for a while
This thing is
One of the cheapest laptops you can get with a GTX 1060 so this thing comes in at just over a thousand dollars
I think like
$1,020 if I'm not mistaken and the build quality is
Really good, the paneling is strong all over
It's got aluminum on the outside the keyboard deck is plastic
But it's very rigid all the surfaces feel oddly strong for the price point
The hinge uses a design where they're closer together, and I normally don't like this
But they've built it very well this year it feels very durable. The port selection is better than most gaming laptops at this price point
Lots of USB ports
A couple of display outs a Thunderbolt 3 port and an ethernet jack
The only thing that I would say it's missing is an SD
card slot and if you're curious the Thunderbolt 3 port is actually full four-lane PCIe not two lanes like some other laptops
Which is nice the internals are accessed really easily
there's just some screws on the bottom the RAM has a cover of some sort but remove that and you can replace the RAM and
You also have access to both drives as well. There's a two and half inch SATA and an M.2 SSD
The battery down here has a bit of a weird shape. It's this giant L
And it's a 60 watt hour battery and I'm getting around four hours of battery life using the 4K screen
You'll also notice down here a woofer dome the speakers on this laptop are pretty good
There are a pair of speakers up top to complement that sub these get really loud like uncomfortably loud
They sound clean at regular volumes and the bass is present
But the moment you crank it up to even like 60 70 percent volume the distortion is pretty severe
The keyboard has a good layout I actually like it a lot the arrow keys are under the number pad
So it makes it very roomy
But it might be weird for people who frequently use a normal number pad the keystrokes are a little shallow
And I feel like it could be a bit more
Responsive on the whole it is a decent keyboard overall and it has RGB backlighting it's lit by zones and not individual keys
But at this price point you're normally stuck with red backlighting
So this is a nice touch the trackpad is an Elan trackpad, and it's okay. It's not ideal
I know a lot of trackpads on gaming laptops never even get used most people just plug up mice for playing and stuff
But I still think it could have been better the surface is nice and the button mechanism is good
But the tracking doesn't feel consistent to me. I'm getting occasional skips another thing that I don't love is the design now
I know I mentioned that the build quality is really good and it is but the design feels
Kind of out of place to me
It's got this crosshatch pattern on it, and it's cool that they went for something different than most other gaming laptops
But I don't know I don't love it
And it's also prone to fingerprint smudges now most of it comes from just the material because it's a matte aluminum
It just shows smudges really readily, but yeah, if that's something that bothers you be aware the screen is okay
I'm using the newly released 4K panel here
I've also used the 1080p panel in the past both are IPS panels
But don't get very bright
Now part of the reason why the screen is dimmer like this is because they put this matte coating on it
You can remove the coating I've seen it done in the past
I've done it before on older Lenovo laptops basically you take a hair dryer heat it up peel it off
I'm not gonna do it on this because it's a review unit
But in the past when you do do it, it does get a little bit brighter
Just because the material is gone
The bezels on the screen are a little thick on the top and bottom but for the money
It's kind of expected and the webcam looks ok it's a 720p cam nothing special
Performance on this laptop is solid it's excellent for 1080P gaming
It'll handle lights and midway titles easily you'll be way above 60 frames per second on just about any
Modern AAA shooter some open-world games can get a bit more demanding
So you might have to lower image quality a little but in general
This laptop is more than enough for 1080p gaming and it's fully VR ready
Only really demanding games or poorly optimized games like PUBG will need lowered graphics settings
And when I play PUBG on this thing I only felt comfortable with the frame weights when I put too low graphics quality
Thermal performance is good
I ran some stress tests and the external temperatures stay comfortable during those tests as well now originally this laptop had some thermal issues when
It first launched
I know that some of the early reviews like the very early units had some issues with external temperatures
But I didn't notice any of that with this unit for the stock fan settings like the automatic fans
They're pretty quiet, and they cool it adequately, but if you put it on extreme cooling it gets really loud
It does help a little bit. I mean temperatures are a little bit lower
It's not really worth it to me though
The extra noise is way too loud
But if you live somewhere warm or you use your computer when you don't have access to air-conditioning
That could be really useful so the Lenovo Y720 this thing gives you some pretty good value for the money
It's everything you'd expect
But it's a very well-built laptop starting at just over
$1,000 the screen is probably its weakest point both the 4K and the 1080p panels feel relatively dim
The keyboard has zoned RGB backlighting, shallow stroke in the keys, but it's comfortable to type on the trackpad uses Elan drivers
And there's some occasional tracking issues
inside the GTX
1060 and the Kaby Lake CPU options are awesome for 1080p gaming and are well cooled without the fan getting too loud
The RAM and both drives are easily upgraded if you want and the battery comes in at 60 watt hours with okay battery life
I'm getting around four hours with the 4K screen so a GTX 1060 laptop for around a thousand dollars is a pretty good value
There's two real competitors to this first is like a broad competitor
Which are the bare-bones systems like Clevo and Sager
But the other kind of brand-name competitor is the Acer Helios 300 which I've reviewed for in the past
They both have black and red gamer aesthetics
I wouldn't call either of them better-looking than the other if you're trying to choose between the two
They're both good the Y720 has better build quality
And I think on the whole is just a more complete laptop. It has RGB backlighting
It's got the Thunderbolt 3 port it has better thermal characteristics. I mean, it's just got more aggressive cooling. It's heavier
It's got a bigger battery it's a more substantial laptop. The Acer Helios 300 it's a little bit cheaper
So you're going to get better bang for your buck in terms of just raw performance
But it is I I would consider it a quote-unquote cheaper feeling laptop
Just because it's got more plastic and the whole device is just lighter weight and everything but seriously both of them are great
Can't go wrong with either of them. I would go for this one if you want build quality
I'd go with the Helios 300 if you want just pure value
Okay, hope you guys enjoyed this video thumbs if you liked it subs if you loved it. See you guys next time